ANA Urges NTIA to Support “DO NOT SELL” List for Brands as Part of ICANN’S Top Level Domain Expansion Program

January 11, 2012; New York, NY - The Association of National Advertisers (ANA) has urged the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) to support ANA's proposal to address specific concerns about ICANN's Top Level Domain (TLD) expansion program.

In a detailed letter to Lawrence Strickling, the Assistant Secretary for Communications and Information and NTIA Administrator, ANA urged the NTIA to publicly support the Association's proposal to ICANN to establish a temporary "Do Not Sell" list as part of the TLD expansion program. Under that proposal, which was delivered to ICANN on Monday, all NGOs, IGOs and commercial stakeholders concerned about protecting their brands when the TLD application window opens on January 12 would be given the opportunity to have those brands registered, without cost, on a temporary "Do Not Sell" list to be maintained by ICANN during the first application round. Any party that does not want to have their brands on the "Do Not Sell" list and would rather apply for a new TLD would be free to do so.

Bob Liodice, ANA President and CEO, stated: "In his letter to ICANN on January 3rd, Assistant Secretary Strickling identified several specific issues that ICANN needs to address, including the perceived need for defensive registrations. Our proposal for a 'Do Not Sell' list is a reasonable, constructive approach that could easily be adopted by ICANN on a temporary basis to address this concern. We hope the NTIA will support this proposal and urge ICANN to work with us on implementing it."

ANA's letter also identified specific concerns about ICANN's program that have been expressed over the past several weeks by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC); a coalition of international law enforcement agencies including the FBI; over 30 intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) including the IMF and NATO; a coalition of non-profit groups; the Council of Better Business Bureaus; the National Consumers League; and a bipartisan group of more than 25 members of Congress from both the Senate and House. The letter argued that before any TLD application is approved, ICANN must at the very least:

Implement all of the law enforcement community's recommendations;

Address the potential for consumer harms cited by the FTC, non-profit organizations and others;

Improve procedures to protect intellectual property, as the proposed procedures are woefully inadequate;

Adopt real and meaningful methods to avoid the need for expensive and unnecessary defensive registrations; and

Implement steps to deal with "root scaling" and other technical concerns expressed by the Internet community.

Liodice stated: "Rather than simply urging ICANN to "consider" measures to address these serious concerns, we believe it is critical that NTIA act much more proactively to provide specific timetables and benchmarks for ICANN to meet and consequences if they fall short. NTIA and the other members of the Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) must hold ICANN accountable."

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About the ANA

Founded in 1910, the ANA (Association of National Advertisers) leads the marketing community by providing its members with insights, collaboration, and advocacy. ANA's membership includes 400 companies with 10,000 brands that collectively spend over $250 billion in marketing communications and advertising. The ANA strives to communicate marketing best practices, lead industry initiatives, influence industry practices, manage industry affairs, and advance, promote, and protect all advertisers and marketers. For more information, visit http://www.ana.net/, follow us on Twitter, join us on Facebook, or visit our YouTube channel.